Posted
by
michael
on Saturday February 07, 2004 @06:13AM
from the tv-is-everywhere dept.

prostoalex writes "Japanese subscribers will be able to get 70 television channels with a new cell phone, currently developed and tested by Samsung. Using an ARM microprocessor, Samsung makes it possible to receive satellite TV transmissions in 2.6 GHz range. No dish is required, however, for clarity of the signal the company is currently installing a network of repeaters. This could substantially increase the number of satellite TV subscribers, which in the United States is still a distant second to cable television."

maybe I am wrong but don't we leave the house so we can do things other than watch TV...or is this a substitue for doing work at work or when your favorite show is on and you have to pick up the kids so now you can do both?
Here's a sidenote to think about: Cellphones use basicly 1 sense and thats hearing which is an important sense but you do have sight so you can concentrate on other things like walking or driving (people argue with this one but truck drivers have been talking on CBs for many years now and they seem ok...maybe not), basicly do whatever. But TVs use both Sight and Hearing...what are you gonna use to walk down the street, smell?
Maybe when the Segway takes over for using our legs for walking and they put in cruise control than we will be ready for Mobile TV

Doesn't the UK have better TV than the US though? And not just TV - later today Radio3 will be broadcasting a recording of a world premiere performance of an Elliot Carter piece commissioned by the BBC. Any American TV stations commissioned any contemporary classical music since CBS commissioned Stravinsky to write The Flood?

Humor aside, it's kind of weird to see people take more and more steps into a kind of nomadic existence. ..

In other words, returning to a more normal, although more technolgical, state of human existence.

Yes, I'm even choosing to take your joke seriously. My 75 year old aunt sold her grand victiorian mansion a few years ago and bought an RV. She now says she'll never live in a house again and wonders why anyone does.

Mobility is humanity. It's only weird to you because you grew up in the narrow little slice of history where people were tied to piles of cinderblock by, rather short, electrical umbilical cords.

The one feature I would like added to my phone is the ability to turn off the phone part. I quite often use the phone to control presentations via Bluetooth, and just have to hope that no one phones me while I'm doing so.

Sorry, I'm being flippant. I realize your post is somehow about conformity, but I just don't get what you're driving at.

Oh, no, MY apology is needed. It's just that 95% of all cell phone conversations most people overhear in public tend to be the type that illustrates that the speaker has nothing better to do than speak at it or use it as a security blanket.

My cell phone is now inactive, but when I used it I would move away from prying ears, not shout "I have a cell phone" to everyone within earshot, thus confirming my insecurities. Or worse, "Look at me! I'm important, I have a cellphone". Yeah, I had one of those original 10 pound Mitsubishi's and service back when cell phones were new and cool.

Uh, define "narrow slice of history". You would be more accurate to say that the nomadic way of life is a phase that a given society goes through until they discover that agriculture surpasses hunting and gathering as a way of sustaining a population. Once that occurs, then villages form, then cities. When a people realize that the land yields sustenance and wealth, some form of property rights take hold. Mostly those rights favor some kind of Big Man or hierarchy over the people who actually work the land, but the rules serve to tie the people to the land even more. As the better fed people of the agricultural society expand, they crowd out the nomads and push that way of life into history. You can see this happening right now, in certain parts of Africa, as the last of the nomadic tribes are supplanted by urban dwellers and farm workers.

What would the battery life be on such a device. My cell phone (A Motorola v60g BTW) only JUST makes it through a single day on one battery at full charge, and that's for a black-and-white screen that's off half the time (when the phone is flipped closed). And I don't even talk on my phone too too much. For an often-on, long-viewing, satellite-receiving, full colour video phone, I can't imagine the battery life would even border on "acceptable".

As a side note: I'm assuimg this phone has the typical 2" (max) screen. That's an awfully small screen to watch TV on. I wonder if there's really a demand for this (after all, one of the reasons Steve Jobs says there's no video iPods is because nobody wants to watch TV on a screen that small-a statement I would tend to concur with).